J-pouch Life

Hi all! So for those of you who have followed my story for the past few months you know there have been many ups and downs.  New theories emerged, the one most perplexing and possibly exciting one being that perhaps I didn’t actually have Crohn’s disease-maybe just a horrible case of pouchitis due to poor [...]

Well, this is one of those days that I come here to post and I wish I had a positive, uplifting one for you…perhaps this will turn out to be just that. Today, I was fired from my job because of my inability to come to work regularly because of my disease. Now, my employer [...]

I think we’ve all been at points of struggle with these diseases where we felt hopeless. For most of us, the J Pouch operation gives us our lives back. It gives us an opportunity to live it. It gives us an opportunity to hope. I have done volunteer work for the Crohn’s and Colitis Foundation [...]

Not sure what’s going on here, but for the past two years, I’ve had a Crohn’s flare over the New Year’s holiday. Perhaps it’s related to stress from the holidays. Either way, it’s time to make a change. Bahamas next year! Does anyone else notice this phenomenon? Things are going totally great, then all the [...]

There’s that great line in the bible (or the Byrds song, whichever you prefer), “a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance.” Prior to my diagnosis of UC and, subsequently, Crohn’s, I was a devoted and passionate dancer.  It was my “thing.”  It was also [...]

Time to boycott the Plaid Pantry, whatever that is. (Is that like a 7-11?). Reading through posts on the Consumerist weblog, trying to decide if I should subscribe to its RSS feed, I came across this article about a fellow IBD sufferer who was denied access to a bathroom. As a result, she pooped her [...]

So, at every previous job since I’ve had IBD I’ve been very vocal about my disease.  It was practical because I was sick at the time, and when people asked me questions, the advocate in me burst forth!  Since I’ve been in remission and managed to get a job in Portland, OR in this crazy [...]

In a timely fashion to Liz’s post on Lets Just Call it IBD, I just stumbled on this story this morning on the yahoo home page.  Apparently a teenage female had been sick with IBD-related symptoms for many years. The doctors called it IBD, probably colitis. She took tissue from her intestine to her high [...]

After receiving an interesting letter from my new GI yesterday, I’ve found myself in a rather contemplative mood.  I was diagnosed with unquestionable serious UC when I was 16.  The GI who diagnosed me recommended immediate surgery to remove the colon.  I declined, preferring instead to take meds for years and try my hand at [...]